DAuthor

Barry Cassell is Chief
Analyst for GenerationHub covering coal
and emission controls
issues, projects and
policy. He has covered
the coal and power
generation industry for
more than 26 years,
beginning in November

2011 at GenerationHuband prior to that aseditor of SNL Energy’sCoal Report.Study Forecasts Huge Fall in U.SCoal Burn Under Clean Power PlanJust how big the coal burn fall is depends on howstates comply with the ruleby Barry Cassell, GenerationHub

Depending on factors like how individual states respond
with their own state implementation plans, coal burn at U.S.
power plants could fall from a little less than 800 million
tons in 2022, the first year for implementation of the U.S.

Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean Power Plan, to as
low as less than 400 million tons in 2030, the final target year
under the CPP.

That is according to a new study on the plan written
by Doyle Trading Consultants LLC’s Sherry Orton. Doyle
Trading Consultants, based in Colorado, has worked for
several years in the area of coal markets, power plant data and
issues consultancy.

EPA on Oct. 23 published the final Clean Power Plan,
which triggered a wave of lawsuits against it filed at the
U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. On January 21,
the appeals court denied the motion to stay the CPP but will
consider the legal merits of the challenge with oral arguments
beginning June 2. The CPP calls for 32-percent greenhouse
gas reductions from existing power plants by 2030, with an
interim deadline in 2022.

Although the EPA has finalized the standards for CO2

emissions from existing fossil-based Electric Generating
Units (EGUs), the nature of how they will be implemented
depends on the actions of the states, the report noted.

The important thing to understand about the Clean
Power Plan is that the covered EGUs must comply with an
emissions rate of 1,305 lbs CO2/MWh for coal and other gas
steam units and 771 lbs CO2/MWh for existing combined-cycle natural gas units by 2030, the report pointed out. The
rest of the details are essentially a variety of accounting
practices for how to calculate the emissions rate given that
means to generate the same amount of electricity from a
fossil-fired unit while producing lower CO2 emissions from
the stack are limited.

The Doyle study pointed out that currently, most coal units
emit between 1,800 lbs/MWh and 2,200 lbs/MWh and existing
combined cycle natural gas units generally emit between 800 lbs/
MWh and 1,400 lbs/MWh. Although the press releases for the
finalized rule describe a “ 32 percent reduction in CO2 emissions
from 2005,” this is an expected result of the application of the
rule, not a requirement that units or states must meet, the study
said. States can choose to implement a mass-based standard